


Melancholy

by Katsala



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Canonical Character Death, Character Study?, Depression, F/F, F/M, Lesbian Character, Original Character Death(s), Unrequited Love, i got feels and then this shit happened
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-29
Updated: 2017-09-29
Packaged: 2019-01-06 20:57:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,855
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12218826
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Katsala/pseuds/Katsala
Summary: Dry your eyes. Put your makeup on. Live.





	Melancholy

  
Cho is five years old when she finds the picture in her mum's dresser while looking for sweets. It's of a girl with her shiny hair tied back, her hands on her hips, shaking her head and laughing at the camera. Her nails are painted deep blue and her eyes look just like Daddy's eyes. When she asks Mum about it, Mum bursts into tears.

"That," Mum explains later when she's stopped crying, "was your big sister. Her name was Calanthe."

"I don't have a sister," Cho tells her, nose wrinkling in confusion. Cho knows what sisters are. Sisters are people that live in your house and help with your hair and share your dolls and aren't allowed to be mean to you. She doesn't have a sister.

"Well," Mum says. "It's a bit complicated."

"I can handle complicated," Cho says flippantly with a wave of her hand, and Mum smiles.

"I know you can, sweet girl." Mum pulls Cho up onto her lap. "Have your father and I told you about He-Who-Shall-Not-Be-Named?"

"No."

"Well, he was a very bad man who did some very bad things when you were a baby. He and his friends hurt a lot of people, including your sister, and sometimes when people get hurt they don't get better."

"Why not?"

Mum starts to cry again. "I don't know. I just don't know, honey." She holds Cho tight for a very long time.

 

* * *

 

 

Daddy takes Cho to her first Quidditch game when she's six. It takes four days for the Tutshill Tornadoes to catch the Snitch, and by then Cho is completely in love with the sport. She begs and begs until he gives in and takes her to Diagon Alley to buy a broomstick.

By the time they get home she's completely forgotten about Mum and Daddy's row. The hole in the wall has been fixed, the glass shards have been cleaned up, and Mum and Daddy watch proudly as Cho flies around on her new broom in the backyard.

Daddy takes her to more and more Quidditch games after that.

 

* * *

 

Cho makes lots of friends at Hogwarts. She tells her parents in her letters, "I've got lots of friends here," because she knows they've always worried about her having friends.

Having friends is exhausting, though. You have to keep talking all the time, but you can't really talk about anything important. You have to talk about blokes and makeup and Rita Skeeter articles. You have to talk about what so-and-so talked about yesterday, then about what so-and-so said about what you said and on and on and on. But you also have to do all of it at the same time as studying until your fingers bleed (well, that's only happened twice, it isn't a big deal) because everyone knows you don't belong in Ravenclaw if your grades aren't good enough, and when you don't belong to your House you don't belong to anything. On the whole it's exhausting.

Quidditch is exhausting too, but in a different way. She's the only girl on the team, and the boys don't talk about blokes and Rita Skeeter. They talk about books and Quidditch and books about Quidditch, and occasionally about girls. They practice like fiends because "practice makes perfect," and Cho loves it, loves the feeling of the broom underneath her hands and the wind whipping through her hair. She loves being a Seeker because it's quiet; just you and the Snitch and the sky.

 

* * *

 

  
Cho's parents break up.

Cho's parents break up and she pretends she doesn't know why (CalantheChoCalantheChoCalantheCalantheCalanthe)

Cho's parents break up, and she didn't even know married people could do that and she doesn't know what to do.

So she does nothing. She dries her eyes and puts on more makeup and goes about school like nothing is wrong, like the letters she gets from her mother aren't smudged with tears and the letters from her father haven't stopped coming, until Marietta Edgecombe- who she's never even talked to before because she's friends with Liz and Cho is friends with Ellis and Ellis and Liz can't stand one another and that's just the way it is- corners her in the bathroom and tells her, "You can talk about it to me. If you want." She scuffs her foot and runs a hand through her curly hair. "My parents, they split up ages ago. Just so you know. 'Cause you're not alone." Marietta sighs. "I'm rubbish at this, sorry."

Cho smiles at her. "You're doing fine."

And from then on Marietta is her friend.

 

* * *

 

  
Cho first meets Cedric on the Quidditch pitch. He's a Seeker just like her. It always seems to be a toss-up of who gets the Snitch in the end, but somehow that doesn't matter because whatever the outcome Cedric will shake her hand afterwards and wink at her. It makes Cho feel like daffodils are blooming on her skin, and Merlin does that sound stupid but she doesn't even care.

He kisses her for the first time in fifth year, in the Prefects bath, and it's messy and awkward but she feels daffodils all over, even when the Gryffindor prefect walks in on them.

She feels happier than she has in a long time.

 

* * *

  
It doesn't last. Nothing good ever seems to last in Cho's life.

Cedric goes into the maze and he doesn't come back out. His body does, but Cho knows more about death than she did at five years old. She knows that the part of Cedric that smiled at her, the part that kissed her with his hands cupping her face, the part that spun her in circles at the Yule Ball, the part that thought she was important enough to be the thing he would "miss the most" in that damn lake, the part that loved his father so much and remembered his mother so well, the part that made hot chocolate for first years who cried after Potions lessons, the part that made terrible puns and called Marietta "Lady Edgecombe", the parts she never knew and will never get the chance to discover, all those things are gone. She knows he isn't going to get better.

She still doesn't know why.

Cho has kept herself bottled up for a very long time. It makes her think of those water heater things she learned about in Muggle Studies, how if they got stopped up they'd sometimes explode, fly right through the roof of the house and into the sky before crashing down.

She can't seem to stop thinking about Calanthe. The next time she's at Mum's house, she steals the photograph of her sister out of the dresser. She stashes it in a box under her bed, along with her pictures of Cedric and her parents' wedding album. She stares at it at night, feeling pressure build up behind her eyes where she wants to cry but can't quite manage.

It's Amos Diggory that finally breaks the dam, ignites the spark, blows the water heater sky high or whatever bloody metaphor she's going with.

He comes by her father's house just before school starts. They have a very awkward tea, during which they talk about the weather. Cho never knew she could talk so much about the weather before that day. But at the end, as she's showing him to the Floo, he turns to her, clears his throat, and says, "Cho. I just wanted you to know- I wanted you to know that you made my boy very happy."

It doesn't make sense that that's what makes her cry. Nothing makes sense anymore.

Cho doesn't know what to do, so she does nothing. She goes back to school, dries her eyes, and puts her makeup on. But the makeup runs from the tears, and she's suddenly not content to talk about nothing anymore. She wants to talk about something. She wants to talk about her feelings. She wants to talk about Cedric. She wants to talk about her parents. She wants to talk about Calanthe.

"Quit being morbid, Cho." "Why can't you just move on, Cho?" "Why won't you just try to be happy, Cho?"

"Shoulder," Marietta says, jutting her shoulder out. "Cry on. Go."

Cho gives her a watery smile and talks.

 

* * *

 

  
The thing about Harry Potter is that she should hate him, and maybe a part of her does.

The thing about Harry Potter is that when he looks at her she feels butterflies in her stomach and she isn't sure when that started and she isn't sure she wants it to end.

The thing about Harry Potter is that he might be mad, and he's definitely dangerous.

When she hears about the defense club, she drags Marietta down to sign up for it. Marietta looks like something smells bloody awful the whole time, but she's all Cho's got right now and she needs her. She needs her.

It never occurs to her that Marietta needs Cho too, until… well.

They're laying on Cho's bed, just the two of them, just talking. Cho is trying her best to explain daffodils and butterflies, and the kiss under the mistletoe with Harry that she cried during, like an idiot, who even does something like that, and she asks, offhand, "Have you ever felt like that?"

Marietta licks her lips and rolls over onto her side so her back is to Cho. Quietly, almost too quietly, Marietta whispers, "Sunshine. It feels like sunshine to me." She reaches her hand back blindly and slips her fingers into Cho's. "All the time. Even when she's- when they're sad. They're kind. They're smart. They're more beautiful than anyone else I've ever met. But they're the only real friend I have. And I don't wanna muck it up. Do you know what I mean?"

Cho swallows hard and squeezes Marietta's fingers. "I'm sorry, Mari."

"Not your fault."

Cho suddenly wishes for a world without daffodils and butterflies and sunshine. She wishes it were dead.

 

* * *

 

  
Marietta, beautiful Marietta, turns up with the word SNEAK branded on her face and Cho sees red.

Their so-called friends from the DA like to prattle on about choice. This was not a choice. This was a scared teenaged girl just trying to protect her mother, just trying to win at a game she shouldn't have been playing in the first place. Cho has had enough of so-called friends. Cho has had enough of Harry Potter.

Some people haven't had enough of her, it seems. She glares at little Dennis Creevey when he sits down next to her and Marietta in the library, Marietta still wearing her balaclava. "Can I help you?" She asks icily in a voice she barely recognizes.

Dennis shrugs. "No." He flips open his Charms textbook and starts reading.

The next day, he does it again and drags his brother along as well. Colin smiles at her so brightly it could count as a holy experience and after that, not everyday but often enough, their party of two becomes a party of four.

 

__

* * *

__

 

There are lots of ways to stage a rebellion. Harry Potter is staging one right now, out in the English countryside hunting horcruxes, though Cho doesn't know that. Neville Longbottom is mounting one at Hogwarts- Dumbledore's Army, Still Recruiting.

Cho and Marietta hold a rebellion in their one bed/one bath flat with a Disillusioned Colin shoved under Cho's bed and a Silenced Dennis hidden up in the fake ceiling.

Marietta takes a job as a clerk at the Ministry, wears her scars spelling SNEAK with pride, and comes home every night so scared she sometimes vomits from fear. Cho goes to work at the Quidditch supply store in Diagon and says nothing when her paycheck comes in late, because her boss is trying his best with business slowed to a halt and one assistant already found dead. London is the epicenter of a storm, and Cho will be damned if she doesn't find a way to ride it.

She takes the paychecks she does get and buys Marietta roses. She buys Dennis sweets. She smuggles Colin the box of photos she used to keep under her bed, the shot of Calanthe that makes her feel hollow and candids of Cedric that make her tear up and the album of her parents back when they were still happy and young and whole. She cries, and then she dries her eyes, puts her makeup on and she keeps going.

And when the "Ministry" stooges finally show up at their door, wands at the ready, Cho doesn't hesitate.

"Okay, quick, Colin," she says as soon as the last Death Eater has fallen Stupified at her feet, "first place that pops into your head, that's where we're going."

"Glasgow."

"Yuck," Marietta says as she shoves all their possessions into a shoebox with an Enlargement Charm on it. "Hate that place, my auntie used to live there. You take him, I'll grab Dennis."

Cho grabs Colin's arm, turns on her heals, and Disapparates.

 

* * *

 

  
They end up Apparating into a dumpster. Colin gets a can embedded in his leg, sort of like a reverse-splinching, and Cho allows herself ten seconds of abject panic before she Vanishes the can and starts pumping out every healing spell she knows. When that finally ends, they climb out of the dumpster and split the rations Colin had on him before they left, which consists of a bottle of water and a candy bar.

"So. Dennis and Mari aren't here," Colin finally says.

"No, they are not." Cho starts to rub her eyes, remembers where she just was and reconsiders. "Probably Apparated badly. Mari is shite at long distances. So, where would they go now? Where would they go, if they couldn't find us?"

Colin chews his lip. "That seems like something we should have figured out beforehand."

"Yup."

They sit there for a few more minutes.

"Okay, let's start thinking. What are ways we could send messages to them?"

"Send up sparks and hope they're in the area."

"Owls."

"Send a message through Potterwatch?"

"Patronuses." Cho blinks. "Oh! That's actually a good idea!"

"You can send messages through a Patronus?" Colin asks.

"Uh… theoretically. I've never done it before."

It takes what feels like an hour of her trying and failing to think enough happy thoughts to trigger the spell, the worry and tension boiling up inside her chest and ruining it, before Colin gets tired of twiddling his thumb. He places his hand on her wrist. "They're okay. You have to have faith they're okay." He interlocks their fingers. "Imagine what happens after. After Harry wins the war, and we go home. Imagine the four of us getting ice cream. The kind with toppings on it, and way too much chocolate syrup that gets everywhere."

Slowly but surely, the silver swan appears from the tip of her wand. "Alright. Now we just have to figure out what we want to say." Cho considers it. It has to be somewhere safe, somewhere both of them can locate easily… "Meet us at Hogwarts," she says confidently.

The swan doesn't move.

"Shoo!" Colin hisses, flapping his hands at it.

Cho gives him a side eyes look. He shrugs. "Okay," she ventures, "the spell itself is all about positive visualization, so maybe I should try and visualize Mari and Dennis?"

Marietta. Curly hair and scars she has never worn proudly. Awkward, but she tries so hard to get it right. She loves her mother and she loves her father but she can't love them at the same time anymore. Sunshine.

Dennis. A tiny little slip of a boy who makes up for it with the size of his heart. Not even being hunted down by people who want to kill him has made him hard; he's still as soft and as good as ever.

The swan takes flight.

"Well. Now we just have to figure out how to get to Hogwarts."

 

* * *

 

  
"We are going to freaking die," Cho sings under her breath. "I hate this and we're going to die."

"Make a right!" Colin shouts.

Cho slams on the gas pedal and turns the wheel so hard the tires squeal. "Merlin! Why couldn't you drive?!"

"My feet don't reach the pedals!"

 

* * *

 

  
There's a spot Cedric and she used to go to, before. There's a large, flat rock hidden behind the trees just at the edge of the Forbidden Forest. They used to go there and read books together, her head in his lap and his hands in her hair-

Her chest aches just thinking about it.

She and Marietta used to go there after. They would do their homework and Marietta let her cry as loud and messy as she needed.

(And if one day Mari leaned over and kissed her, on the lips, and whispered hoarsely, "I had to do it at least once, you know?", and Cho felt nothing and Mari felt everything, then that's their business and no one else's.)

That's where they meet. Dennis is shivering from an encounter with a Dementor and Marietta has twigs in her hair, but they're both there, alive and whole.

Dennis smiles at her even though he's shaking. There's a flash of gold in his hand- a galleon. "We had an idea of where we could stay."

Cho's heart sinks. Cho's heart sings.

* * *

 

When they reach the Room of Requirement, there's already a dozen people camped out there. They are very happy to see Colin and Dennis. They are not happy to see Marietta and Cho.

Cho gets into a shouting match about it with Terry Boot when he drops in two days later bringing dinner, and she's honestly surprised it took that long for someone to snap. She's also surprised it was Terry, because he's a bit of a pushover and she hadn't thought he had it in him to preach about loyalty to friends and the selfishness of putting yourself over the majority.

So she yells him down, talks about loyalty to family over friends and how children makes mistakes when they're scared and that she's already been disfigured, isn't that enough of a punishment, while Mari huddles in the corner and tries to hide her scars behind her hair while Colin and Dennis sit on either side of her and do their best to look fearsome whenever anyone looks their way. It's a good effort.

By the time she's done, Padma Patil has slipped over and slid Mari and the Creeveys some chocolate. "So, what's it like out there? The Daily Prophet's been rubbish lately, they've got a four page spread on the weather."

And they don't talk about it again.

 

* * *

 

  
Harry, Ron and Hermione come back, and they bring danger with them just like always. Cho would be upset about it, but she's seen the scars on poor Julie Rylie's back, the bite marks on sweet Demelza Robin's breasts, the way Ken Keller flinches when anyone talks to him and how Parvati Patil has twisted and twisted in on herself until she barely seems human some days. She's heard Ernie Macmillan wake himself up from nightmares screaming in terror, and she had to wake Dennis up from his silent dreams of being trapped up in the ceiling again, not even able to hear his own breathing, praying she and Mari won't forget about him, that he won't rot up there. Cho wants a little dangerous.

Then she looks at Colin. She looks at Dennis. She looks at Mari.

She touches Mari's arm lightly. "Get then out and keep them out."

Mari nods gravely. "Be careful." She pauses and bounces on her toes before whispering, "I love you," pecking Cho on the cheek, grabbing the boys' hands and taking off into the crowd of evacuating students.

"I'm sorry," Cho says to the empty space in front of her.

* * *

 

  
Things get fuzzy after that. When she tries to remember it later, it's all in bits and pieces. It's watching curses fly through the air, listening to people scream and knowing you can't help them because if you do you'll be dead. It's the pain in her side as her skin turns black and withered and the numbness in her foot that won't go away for twenty years. It's watching Parvati's bloodthirsty expression as she does away with Stunners and starts casting Cutting Charms on the arms of her targets. It's panicking and casting the Imperious Curse on a Snatcher before he can get Hannah Abbot in the back, superimposing her anger and fear onto his soul, forcing him to cast the Imperious Curse on the next person in line, then again and again and again until her own mind feels like it's cracked and bleeding from how far it's stretched.

It's seeing Colin on the battlefield, stupid, recklessly brace Colin who must've gotten away from Mari somehow, trying to make her way towards him and being too late as he goes down under a burst of green light. It's screaming until her throat is raw and tears streaking down her face as she casts Crucio on anyone she can get her hands on, because even though Cho never heard her say it, Bellatrix was right. You do have to mean it.

 

* * *

 

  
Calanthecedriccolincalanthecedriccolincalanthecedriccolincalanthecedriccolincalanthecedriccolin

Cho wakes up after the battle in a bed at Saint Mungos. Apparently the curse that was rotting away the flesh on her left side didn't actually stop when she thought it did. The Healers managed to get it stamped out and heal the dead skin, but now she has a massive web of scars reaching out across her waist like long, twisted fingers. She also has to learn how to walk without dragging her right foot across the ground because she can barely even move it, barely even feel it.

She's alive. That's more than some can say.

 

* * *

 

  
She goes back to her one bed/one bath London apartment with Mari. She goes back to work at the Quidditch supply store. She dries her eyes, puts on her makeup, and invites Padma Patil over for tea. She goes to Denny's house to bring him sweets and smile as his sisters tease him. She pulls the box of pictures out from under her bed and sees the additions Colin left her: unmoving Muggle photos, frozen as if he'd stolen the moments from time itself, shots of Denny laughing so hard Butterbeer sprayed out his nose, Mari posing with her face turned to the side so her scars don't show, Colin in the mirror with part of his thumb covering the lens, and one of Cho herself, caught mid-laugh, hair tied back, one hand on her hip and the other covering her mouth. Her nails are painted blue.

Calanthecalanthecalanthe

Mari comes home from getting groceries to see Cho curled up on the bathroom floor next to the smoldering remains of the only picture of Calanthe she ever had. Mari holds her and sings lullabies while Cho sobs so hard she shakes.

And then the next day, she gets up, dries her eyes, puts on her makeup and goes to work.

 

 

 

 


End file.
